"Spider Robinson - And Subsequent Construction" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robinson Spider)

passed. The question that kept digging around under my skin like a burrowing
parasite was: where the hell was I?
(Am I going too fast? Brunner tells the story of a prof scrawling equations on the
lecture-hall blackboard who declaimed, "It is therefore obvious -- " ... frowned,
scratched his head, left the hall amid growing murmurs, and returned ten minutes
later to announce triumphantly, "I was right: it is obvious!" I often have the same
trouble communicating with those more fortunate than myself. Hyperintelligence is a
very mixed blessing.)
My antinomy was this: if I were to succeed in inventing ... oh, let's give in and call
it a time machine ... I was sure the first thing I would do with it (after testing it for
safety) would be to come back and tell me I was going to succeed. Naturally I would
not have told myself how I'd done it -- don't you hate it when someone tells you how
the book is going to come out? -- but I'm so cocky I didn't see how it could hurt to
have my cleverness confirmed in advance.
So the fact that I had not met me during my first two months of work had been
unnerving. No: maddening!
And now, at last, here me was. The sense of relief was overwhelming.
"Eventually," me said, "we'll either have to restructure English, or speak math.
But for now, let's try to keep this as simple as possible. You can call me Jay, eh?"
I believed I understood. Jay is what comes after Eye-for-Iris in the alphabet, and
the way Jay phrased it raised resonances of another old-time comedian we both
loved because he had only a single joke to his name: his name. I forgot what sort of
bird a jay is.
Pantomiming the classic "Me Tarzan, you Jane," I said, "I ... Jay ... 'kay," and had
the satisfaction of seeing my self smile at one of my own puns. No one else but
Teodor ever does.
But there was something about that smile I recognized all to well, even without
the usual mirror-reversal.
Jay was miserable, through and through. So saturated with sadness, I think even
another person could have seen it.
"What's wrong?" I cried ... and then remembered what had once made me look
that sad, and what had cured me. My yo-yo heart plummeted again. "Oh, no! Ted's -
-"
"No," Jay said at once. "It's almost worse than that, Iris. He's still alive. But we're
divorced. Bitterly."
I screamed. First time in my life. Then: "WHY?"
"Do you really want to know?"
 "Hell. Of course not. Thank you. Any ... any hope at all?"
"I don't think so," she said.
Despair. "Ah Jay, Jay -- why did you tell ... cancel: I asked you. Oh, damn me!
And my cursed curiosity ... "
I had never in my life wished more fervently that I'd been born a normal human
being, able to not think things through if I chose. Can you imagine how fervently
that is? I wasted ten whole silent seconds feeling sorry for myself -- a lifetime record
-- before I was able to turn my attention to feeling sorry for my other self ... who
had been in this pain for much longer than I had. That selfishness I mentioned
earlier. "Is there anything I can do to help you, Jay?"
"Yes."
"What?"
Jay didn't answer. In a second, I got it. If you'd lost your life's one love, wouldn't